Ep:11 Right at Home CEO Shares ‘The Positive Side of COVID-19 — and He Doesn’t Mean the Test Results’

Miriam Allred (00:05):

Hey, this is Miriam. Allred and you’re listening to Home Care Pulse’s Vision | The Care Leaders’ Podcast. The show where I chat with industry leaders about relevant topics, providers need to hear. My guest today is Brian Petranick the CEO of Right at Home. In 2000, Brian joined founder, Allan Hager and launched the Right at Home franchise system. During his nearly 20 years with the company Brian served as VP of operations, COO, and ultimately president and CEO. Brian’s leadership has been instrumental in growing the organization from its initial location, Omaha, Nebraska, to an internationally recognized home care brand with over 650 operating territories in eight countries. Let’s get to it. The topic we want to touch on today is the positive side of COVID and we don’t mean the test results. So really to get started, I want to talk about the shift in consumer recognition and adoption. So how have you seen Brian, these consumer behaviors and mindsets change over the course of the pandemic?

Brian Petranick (01:09):

Yeah. And, and, and I’ll touch a little bit just kind of quickly on the topic. When, when I started thinking about the topic for this, the, the, the idea is, and I’ve been talking about this really since the beginning of March, I was just seeing some really positive things or some cool things that were happening within our, you know, and not only within the corporate office, but across our system as well. And during this whole time, I’ve, I’ve just keep reiterating to our team and to our system and to others that there’s really positive things that are happening. And it’s a, it’s a terrible environment. And I realized that people are sick and we have people that are dying, but it, but there’s also positive things, especially for our industry. And so that’s where, that’s where this concept came, came up from. And specifically to your, specifically to your question on, you know, shift in consumer recognition and adoption.

Brian Petranick (01:59):

So this is, you know, this is something that as an industry home care has been working really very hard at for the last 20 to, you know, certainly 20, 25 years. It, it wasn’t that long ago. And to still some degree exists today, that people just really don’t know about home care and don’t really understand what it is, and don’t really think about it until they, until they need it. So we’ve, we’ve been battling that for a long time. You know, we, we go out and we build relationships in our communities and all of those types of things we see advertising. Now that’s become a more prevalent thing, especially with some of the larger brands we’re advertising on TV, and there’s a lot more that’s happening in social media and, and with, with web and all of those types of things. And it’s still bringing a lot of just recognition to, to the space.

Brian Petranick (02:50):

And so I think one of the things that’s really, that’s been a really positive result of this pandemic has all of the sudden this industry and the things that we do are really at the forefront of people’s minds. Even just last night, I was, I was hearing a interview done on one of the national talk shows, TV and radio talk shows on one of the major news channels. And the whole discussion was about senior isolation. And, and how do you, how do you combat senior isolation what’s happening in nursing homes and, you know, as a result of the pandemic and any even going forward, and, you know, the host said, look, this, this is what it looks like from all research. This has been an issue for a long time, but the pandemic has really is really highlighted. And I couldn’t agree with that more so, you know, we’re just seeing a lot more attention in this area.

Brian Petranick (03:43):

There’s discussions, like I said, on national radio and TV about this we’re seeing even changes with our policy makers. We know that CMS as an example, back in, in April approved tele psychiatry, because they were recognizing that senior isolation, senior depression, those types of things were going to become a huge issue if not already a huge issue during this pandemic, because we were, we were isolating individuals in their home environment and keeping them away from their families. So CMS put that in place said, well, we’ll start paying for tele psychiatry. It was looking like it was going to be a temporary thing in June, they made it permanent. So I think, I think we just now know that this is in the forefront of people’s minds. We’re talking about it. Families are having to talk about this decisions we’re having to be made about whether we keep our family members in congregate living facilities in communities, or do we bring them home. And that’s just led to a lots of discussions about senior care, senior isolation and home care in particular and options that are out there. And I think that that’s, that’s great because it’s all been done in a very short period of time. So this just all had all these conversations and discussions have really risen to where they are since, since March. And that’s that that could have taken years and years if it wasn’t for this environment.

Miriam Allred (05:08):

Definitely. Yeah. You mentioned CMS. I want to talk a little bit about the state and national advocacy as well. You know, we have all this awareness, all this attention right now, but how do we make sure we maintain that? And what’s the role of association advocacy?

Brian Petranick (05:25):

Yeah, I think that’s the other thing that, you know, if we’re all as, as home care providers, whether you’re with the franchise or under a franchise brand, or you’re an independent or whatever, you you’ve recognized that there was so much change occurring with policy change public, you know, bound with public policy change, but also just home care policy and regulation changes sometimes right down to the, to the municipality level, there was, there was all the mandates on PPE and, and all of those types of things. So there was just a massive amount of information that was flowing during this pandemic period of time. And I think what that did, and, and we know there was also a lot, a lot of legislation and changes that were being made. You know, not only with the, the loans that were there to support businesses and those types of things, but also even going back, I think back in March, where there was concerns about whether caregivers could even be out on the roads driving, going to shifts because they weren’t considered essential.

Brian Petranick (06:28):

And so all of the work that had to be done to make sure that our caregivers were considered essential. Well, what that, what that did is that coalesced a whole bunch of large organizations on both the home health side, as well as the home care side to get together, bring our advocacy groups together, whether it’s knock or HCAOA and try to affect policy change in the midst of this pandemic to make sure that, that we were being recognized, our caregivers were being considered essential as an, as a specific example. So w so what that is is we, we need to, we need to take a step back and say, you know, it’s easy to forget how important having strong advocacy and how, how important it is to have a strong association behind you, how easy it is to forget the importance of that during good times, but when things go bad or when there’s issues, that’s when you need a strong association.

Brian Petranick (07:24):

And so I think we saw for example, and I’m on the board of HCAOA. So I don’t mind saying this. I really think we saw the best of HCAOA in these last few months come together. And the, the, the executive director there, Vicki and the team and the things that they did to support our industry, working with other associations like NAHC and leaders of leaders, leaders of large brands, as well as independence to really make positive changes at the national and state level. So I think the key thing is we should all feel very good about the association. That’s a positive. I saw a lot of people who don’t normally talk, talking to try to figure out how to, how to lift this industry up during this time period. And so we can’t forget that as we go forward and we need to continue to support when times are good. We need to support those associations because we’re going to need them again,

Miriam Allred (08:18):

Love it. Yeah, exactly. Appreciate all said there. I want to shift gears a little bit and talk a little bit more about Right at Home. You know, the last six months have pushed our industry forward. What seems like, you know, maybe six years, like you’ve outlined. And I want to talk about that change of pace and maybe get some specific examples from some of your providers. What, what may be examples of heightened agility and flexibility have you seen from, from right at home providers?

Brian Petranick (08:48):

Yeah. Great, great question. I, you know, I think that that is again, a positive just in general, if, think about what, what you’ve accomplished in your businesses or what we’ve accomplished in our businesses over the last six months you know, I’ve joked and on other, on other things that I’ve done, other speaking opportunities I’ve done. I use the example all the time of, you know, if I had gone to my corporate team and said, you know, I’m thinking about turning our entire corporate team into a remote environment. If I had proposed that back at the beginning of March, we’d still be talking about it today. And it’s very likely, we’d still be talking about it in about six months and thinking it through and we’d come up with all the reasons why it couldn’t work and all the challenges. And we’d have meeting after meeting, after meeting, but in this environment, we did it in 10 days or less.

Brian Petranick (09:41):

We said, my gosh, we’ve got to go remote. And we went and remote, and that meant making sure everybody had the right computer setups and technology in all of those types of things in 10 days. And so I’ve talked about that a lot, and I pointed that out, not only internally to our team here, but in, across our network, but like I said, in kind of broader, broader opportunities. So, so I think one of the things that we should be thinking about as organizations is how do we take what we’ve learned, what the best of what came out of this pandemic is probably some of this, just recognizing that, gosh, we can change a lot faster than we think we can be a lot more agile than we think we can be if we just remove whatever barriers we put in front of that change process.

Brian Petranick (10:26):

And I think the same for our offices. So you asked specifically about things that were being done, kind of at the provider level. You know, we, we had, we saw offices do the same. So all of, you know, many, if not all of our offices went remote also. And that’s probably something that, you know, you would have said go cash. That’s never going to happen in home care office, but it happened. But to make that right, what happened with organizations that are hiring a lot of caregivers and trying to onboard new caregivers into the organization that meant that you had to think about things like, how do you, how do you go through orientation? How do you do training? How do you interview, how do you get background checks done in an environment where States are way slowed down or stopped on their background check processes or whatever.

Brian Petranick (11:12):

And so, so we had to find ways and, and help our, our network or for our network to find ways to, to go remote and to, and to provide that training in that virtual environment or the, the access to PPE and, you know, and that became a huge issue. We all know personal protective equipment was a big issue. It’s just not that many months ago. And so, you know, people that never really had to think about it, including at the corporate office, we never worried that much about PPE. It was always out there. It was very easy to get. And then all of a sudden we came into an environment where it was a scarce resource and it was an important resource for us to continue. So we just had to get really creative and just, and just think different, truly think differently. I hate to use the term because it’s overused, but, but think outside the box and get things done.

Brian Petranick (12:03):

And so that type of thinking, what, what can we do? How do we get this done? And the pace of change, I think, are all, all positives. And then the other thing that came out of this too, is just the, the level of connections that we were making with our, with our caregivers, because they had so many concerns about care protocols and, and PPE. And all of those that I think is across the, across our network, we probably saw interactions with our caregivers increase 500%, which is great for engagement, and it helps with retention and helps with all of those things.

Miriam Allred (12:43):

Yeah. And I’m curious, you know, you have locations across the country, even internationally from the corporate level, did you streamline, you know, you talk about remote work or all of these changes made, did you streamline that or did you just say, ‘hey, these are some options, but you guys choose’, what was that communication like?

Brian Petranick (13:04):

So it’s a great question. And it was a little bit of both. So you know, fortunately we have some scale and some resources and, and the ability to, to act and streamline. So in, you know, one very quick area was PPE. We, we were able to, to kind of build our own machine here very quickly to be able to buy and source or source by, and then, and then deliver PPE to all of our offices, to, to base, you know, to keep them going. It was, we, you know, and, and the kind of the, my approach and the team might my executive team approach, our leadership team here, when this all broke, we said, what, what things can we do to, and where can we bring our scale and our efficiencies to bear, to help our, our franchise network and our network of operating offices manage this issue as best as we can.

Brian Petranick (13:58):

So we looked for areas where we could bring efficiencies, where we could streamline from our side. And then there was just some other areas that, that we really couldn’t do that because it it’s, you know, it’s at the hyperlocal level to some degree. So we, we did a a fair job of trying to identify things that we could do that were within our purview to do easily, efficiently and, and make a difference for our, for our network. And then where we couldn’t, we, we provide a lot of guidance and support and they, and they leaned on each other, our branch directors and our franchise owners were leaning on each other to learn those things as well.

Miriam Allred (14:36):

Okay. Yeah. That’s a great segue to this next topic of, you know, structuring the business. Want to talk a little bit about how right at home is adapting the workplace. We talked about, you know, remote work, but what are some other adaptations that have that made more at the agency level and which ones have proven to be most beneficial?

Brian Petranick (14:59):

So I think some of the things that I already mentioned, I, I think the, the, the orientations that the, like the virtual orientations, virtual interviewing some of the care training delivery and care, care, practice updates, and those things in more, in more real time obviously, you know, personal protective equipment is going to be a part of, of who you are going forward, but those, those types of things. And I, and I think what we’re trying to, what we’re all trying to figure out right now to some degree, and I don’t mean just right at home, but I’m even outside of right at home is what, what of, all of these changes that we’ve made, what’s gonna stay. And what’s, you know, where are we going to go back to quote unquote normal, which was whatever we were doing back in February, and what should we be looking at to say, look, there’s no reason to go back to that because we’ve proven that we can do it this way.

Brian Petranick (15:55):

It’s much more efficient it’s being received well. So that, you know, again, things like virtual training, virtual orientations, our ability to get caregivers into the workforce, into, into the client’s homes, faster, those types of things. So we’re, we’re looking really hard right now at, at, you know, what, when we can get back to some level, or as we’re working to get back to some level of normalcy, what w what do we want to keep versus what do we want to go kind of go back to the way we used to do things and where is there a blend, or is there an opportunity to blend those two things together? So it was a lot of it has to do with how we’re engaging with our care staff, how we’re engaging with our clients. And the key thing I think that we all should be focusing on not losing is the level of engagement, because I think across the board, and I’ve talked to leaders and other organizations as well across the board, we’ve all just increased our level of engagement across our networks. We’re just put a different way. We’re just talking to our branch directors, we’re talking to our franchise owners, we’re talking to the staff, we’re talking to our care staff a lot more in our clients in a lot of ways more than we did in the past. And not that it was bad in the past, it’s just, we had in this environment to do it more. And, and we’re learning. That’s a really good thing. People, people like that, they’re more engaged

Miriam Allred (17:19):

You’re using the word engagement and I’m thinking communication, you know, we’ve seen an increase in communication. And, you know, personally, I feel like we’re, we’re getting to the point where it’s a lot of communication, you know, there’s a lot of noise but maybe you could highlight or point out some of the most important communications are right now inside of an agency. You know, there’s a lot of communication that needs to take place, which is great, but, you know, do you worry about the noise and what can providers do to kind of cut through that and make sure the most important message is delivered?

Brian Petranick (17:58):

Yeah, that’s a, it’s a really interesting and intriguing question that I don’t know if I have a great answer for it yet, because you know, one of the things I’m, I’m very, very concerned about and taught in a bit of talking about a lot is kind of this concept and I’m calling COVID fatigue. So, you know, we’re, we’re six months, seven months in into this thing. And you can just feel, you just, even generally in society, you can feel, people are just kind of get tired of it. Right. They’re tired of the masks. They’re tired of social distancing. They’re tired of having no football and no sports or, or whatever. And, and so you’re, you’re just feeling that people are kind of like, we just, we want, and I, and I’ve heard a lot of people say we just got to get back to some level of normal state.

Brian Petranick (18:43):

Well, who knows what that level of normalcy is actually going to be. Right. But so I think, I think it’s, it’s tough because we’re, you know, I’ve even noticed within my own networks and where I was participating in some think tanks and some things like that that were where we were literally talking two times a week. Those have all started to scale back or have already scaled back. So now it’s, you know, down to once a month or once a quarter. And I think that we’re, so we’re all kind of starting to pull back recognizing what you’re, what you’re talking about Miriam is that there’s just so much communication now. And then there’s just this kind of, this concept of COVID fatigue. We’ve just heard about it so much. So I think the key thing really is going to be, again, the, the, the important communication is, is the communication that is it’s meaningful.

Brian Petranick (19:42):

It’s the communication with the caregivers, especially if we’re still operating in some level of a remote environment, or, or if we go to more as if we adopt, for example, going forward more virtual hiring practices where we’re seeing people less in that process longterm, that’s not good because we want to make sure that we still have those individual touch points. This still is a caring business, and this is a business where connection makes, makes sense. And so we want to make sure that we, we are finding ways that we’re, we’re using the technology we’re using virtual, for example, as a way to augment and bring some efficiencies in, but it doesn’t become just how we do it going forward. Because the last thing in the world, I think any agency wants is a more arms length relationship with their care staff, right? Because we don’t see them because they’re providing most of their work in the clients, in the client’s homes. And if we, if we have, you know, overt nurse oversight or, or, or care oversight that comes in on a periodic basis, or that’s being done now virtually we’re, we’re seeing them even less. So I think that there’s that balance. I’m not sure really what it is. We’re we haven’t, we haven’t really started to tail tail that back significantly yet. But I think that’s, that’s going to be a question we’re going to have to answer.

Miriam Allred (21:08):

I kind of put you on the spot there, but I, it’s a question, you know, that we’re asking in home care, but every industry is asking right now, you know, there’s just this increase of communication coming from so many fronts, you know, that we can feel overwhelmed, but I think it’s kind of an equalizer in that. We’re trying to figure it out. Everyone’s trying to figure it out and, you know, we’re all adapting at the same time, which, which I really appreciate. So shifting gears a little bit, you know, let’s talk about maybe the broader opportunities that lie ahead within healthcare and within home care. You know, we talk a lot about the continuum and home care solidifying its place in the continuum, but what are some opportunities that you feel like lie ahead for our industry?

Brian Petranick (21:52):

Well, I do think that this, this environment discovered environment has really accelerated a lot of the discussion around the role of, of home care. We know really in the last two to three years, it’s in particular, the last two to three years, there seems to be a lot more interest from home health and, and sort of the other side of, and the rest of the healthcare ecosystem about home care and what we do, and the role that we could play as, as reimbursement models are shifting. And we’re moving to more value based types of models. You know, I think everybody pretty widely recognizes that there’s a really interesting and intriguing role for home care. Now, having said that we recognize there’s an interesting and intriguing role. Doesn’t mean we’ve all figured out exactly what that looks like, and we’re, we’re trying to figure those things out.

Brian Petranick (22:45):

And it’s going to be a little bit of trial and error probably for quite some time, as we try to figure out the, how, how we work with Medicare Advantage programs. Exactly. And, and how we partner with home health and where we fall within narrow networks and all of these things that are, that are sort of forming around us within the healthcare care industry. So I think there’s a lot about, I think there’s really quite a bit of opportunity if you just look at just our space in itself. You know, if we, if we just think I’d kind of identify yourselves as private private providers, private pay, private duty, whatever you want to call it, there’s, there’s still a tremendous amount of opportunity just based off of the demographics, the shifting demographics, changing buying behaviors as we move from traditionalist to baby boomers and those types of things.

Brian Petranick (23:31):

So there’s a tremendous amount of opportunity just still on that side. I think there’s quite a bit of opportunity. That’s still is out there. It’s untapped potential, but there’s a lot of potential as home care can get worked in and sort of married with the rest of the healthcare ecosystem. So those things are going to be going to be developed. Like I said, there is no blueprint for it specifically right now. But that means that the industry is going to become and is becoming already has become more sophisticated and more complex. So I think that that’s one aspect of this as we look forward, we can just look at, think about complexity and sophistication is becoming more and more important.

Miriam Allred (24:20):

And I want to pry a little bit, you know, you say ‘untapped’ any insight as to what that might look like?

Brian Petranick (24:29):

Well, you know, I’ll just take one example of it, if you just take Medicare Advantage and just look at what’s happening in the Medicare Advantage space, and this is something that most of the people listening to this are probably very well aware of. And, but if you really just take a time to study Medicare advantage and, and how the number of enrolled within Medicare Advantage programs goes up here after year. And it’s going up at a pretty rapid rate from 2014 to 15 to 16 to today, we’re seeing more and more people enrolling in those, those programs. And I think it’s pretty clear that Medicare wants that to happen. I think they’re doing a lot to drive people into those programs because ultimately CMS needs to provide care in the least expensive manner possible. And so putting people into, or having people opt into advantage programs allows for Medicare to do some things and capitate their costs and all of that.

Brian Petranick (25:32):

And they push risk down onto insurance companies who then put risk, push, push risk down on to, to providers. So I think we’re going to see that, that in itself, if you just study the potential that Medicare advantage has it’s pretty intriguing. But the challenge though is it’s not really materialized in a, in a grand way as of yet, because there’s just too many, there’s just too many competing priorities at the moment, insurance companies, trying to figure out how to make this work you know, trying to keep their own costs down and trying to figure out where, where we come in from a home care standpoint to help keep those costs down. There’s, there’s other things they’re trying to work into the program. So it, it’s not, there’s no, there’s no magic formula for it yet. There’s some interesting programs out there that are, are showing some value. But so when I talk about untapped potential, that’s, that’s one particular area that I think is incredibly interesting going forward. But, but at this point I would say, that’s what it is. It’s on, it’s on untapped potential.

Miriam Allred (26:44):

No, I don’t want to go down a Medicare Advantage rabbit hole, but we, you know, that’s a hot topic in our industry and just, I want to maybe provide, or you to provide a little bit of advice for people listening. What would be, you know, some next steps, like you said, agencies have a lot of different priorities and sometimes it’s hard to, you know, focus in on, on Medicare Advantage and make that a priority, but what would be some next steps for an agency to, you know, set themselves up to be ready for the opportunity when it feels right?

Brian Petranick (27:19):

Yeah. So I, it’s a great question. I would say one of the things that’s incredibly important is making sure that as best as you can you have your data house in order. So what I mean by that is, is that if, whether you’re just a single single site location, or you’ve got a couple of different locations or whatever, that, that you have processes that are, that are consistent, so that your, your tracking information, the same with all of your clients and that you can easily go in and access that that information, it also, you have to think about in your own businesses, you have to think about what is the, what, what data what’s the story that data is telling you, and is there anything that’s missing? Cause you, you, you then have to kind of understand what, what that the Medicare Advantage companies and the insurance companies, what, what they want and what they’re trying to do.

Brian Petranick (28:18):

I mean, this is really coming down to figuring out how to deliver costs in, in the most efficient manner, efficient, also meaning least expensive, but with, with good outcomes. And so the better your, your data house is in order the better off you’re going to be. I would also spend a lot of time is as best as you possibly can. If this is an area that you truly want to explore, and you don’t have a, you know, a larger organization or a parent company, that’s helping you do this, then, then I would read and understand it as best as you possibly can. Cause it’s a complex space. There’s a lot of very smart people smart you know, independents out there as, as well as people tied with, with franchise systems or broader organizations that have put a lot of time and effort and energy into this, into this.

Brian Petranick (29:12):

And if, if found it’s if it’s time, it’s time consuming. And it’s, it’s not always very clear. So just understand as best as you can. You want to go in with as much information as you possibly can and understand that, understand the, the dynamics and kind of what’s driving the, the, the insurance companies and the things that they’re interested in. So that’s what I would say is, is make sure that your, your data house in order that you’ve got, you’ve got good quality, you’ve got good processes that you’re measuring your quality using Home Care Pulse, of course or if there’s other things that you’re using in you know, alongside Home Care Pulse, make sure you’re measuring your quality. You can, you can talk to quality and that you, you really understand the space that you’re getting into.

Miriam Allred (30:01):

Fantastic. I keep setting you up for these spur of the moment questions, but you deliver. So I appreciate that response, you know, Medicare Advantage is so complex. And to be honest, you know, I only understand it at a high level, but, but it’s relevant. And it’s interesting. And I appreciate what you’ve said about, you know, data collection and processes, and just honing in on that organization because, you know, there’s just a lot more to come. So I appreciate all of that.

Brian Petranick (30:29):

Well, sorry, let me, sorry to interrupt. Let me add one other thing here real quick to add to that point about the complexity. And I’m not, this is not my line. I’m going to steal this from somebody else because it was brilliant. It made me laugh out loud, but it was, it was brilliant. They said, you know, there’s something like 4,000 Medicare Advantage programs offered across the country, regionally and locally. And I heard somebody at a conference, not that long ago within the last year. Back when we were still having conferences, I heard somebody say, look, ‘if you know, one Medicare Advantage program, you know, one Medicare Advantage program’. And what that means is that if you know, one that doesn’t mean, you know, the other 3,999, you know that one, but you don’t know the next one because they all approach it differently. They’re all thinking about it differently. Making changes that conceptually they’re all generally the same, but how they think from an insurance standpoint, how they think about it, how, how, you know, their, their actuarial models and their care models that they’re doing behind the scenes are, are different. And so, so I love that line if you know, one Medicare advantage program, you know, one Medicare Advantage program.

Miriam Allred (31:37):

Yeah. That’s so accurate. And I appreciate you. Yeah. Interjecting that, to get that in. Really just one more question and we’ve kind of touched on it, but what does the future look like for Right at Home? You know, maybe the next three to five to 10 years, if you could give us any sneak peeks or exciting news and same for the industry. Anything that you anticipate or excited to see come forth?

Brian Petranick (32:03):

Yeah. So I, you know, I, it’s, it’s a great question. I would say generally, I, you know, I’ve, I’ve previewed a little bit of it, so we’re, we’re putting a lot of time and effort and energy right now into our D our data house, our data collection, what our data is telling us and how we, we can position that, that information and that data going forward, how that can position right at home, not just to help write at home, but I also think just to broadly help the industry, I think we’ve got such a fabulous story to tell within this industry. And so the more that work together through whether it’s through our association, which I, I know the home care association is also, and all the, all the partner companies and home care association are very, very interested in, in aggregating data to some degree on an, on an industry level because we know the power that it has.

Brian Petranick (32:59):

So, so we’re cleaning up our, our data house and working, and we’ve been doing that already for several years working on that. So, so there’s, there’s value for us strategically as an organization, but I think there’s also value for the broader industry. So that’s, that’s one thing that’s really important for us. The other thing that we’re doing is I don’t think this is a secret we’re, you know, we have been primarily a franchise organization for the majority of my time here, which has been actually all of my time here. We’ve primarily been a franchise organization I’ve been with right at home for 21 years and started the franchise side of the organization with our, with our founder at the time. In the last couple of years, we’re, we’re making a much more purposeful and intentional move into corporate owned locations. So we’re expanding through it by operating our own locations.

Brian Petranick (33:49):

That’s been incredibly good for us as an organization. That’s my background. I, I, you know, back in the early nineties, I was running and opening home care offices for a different organization. So, but they were all corporate owned. So I liked that. I think there’s a lot of value. We’re certainly not going away from franchising by any stretch of the imagination. But I think there’s a lot of value in, even with the things I talked about, data collection that that’s going to give us a platform to test some new concepts and some ideas and some things where we control all the variables, which you don’t necessarily do within a, within a franchise office. So that’s, that’s something that’s important for us as well. And then, you know, just, I mean, we’re constantly evaluating the industry, constantly evaluating the senior care space to see like everybody else to kind of figure out where technology is going to fit into this and what type of technology. So we’re, we, we do a fair bit of, of research and thought around, you know, what other ways can we bring value to our, our clients and what things can we bring in to to improve the experience for our families, our clients, and our caregivers?

Miriam Allred (35:04):

Well, it’s been a rich conversation. There’s so much that we’ve talked about and, you know, we could dive so much deeper on all these topics, but I appreciate everything that’s been said. Home care Pulse is, you know, grateful to be a partner with Right at Home and we just appreciate what you stand for. We thank you so much for taking the time to join us on today’s show.

Brian Petranick (35:24):

Oh, absolutely. Miriam. I really appreciate the opportunity. And we also value our relationship with Home Care Pulse. We’ve been with you all for a long time. And as I told you, it kind of precession before we started recording. I just think you guys are, are positioned so beautifully and really can help our broader industry as we move forward with some of these things that we’re talking about, data and quality measurement and all that. So we appreciate what you do as well.

Miriam Allred (35:50):

Thank you, Brian. All the best to you and your team and stay healthy and safe out there. And we’ll continue the conversation in the coming weeks and months.

Brian Petranick (35:59):

Sounds great again, I appreciate the opportunity. Take care.

Miriam Allred (36:04):

Thanks for listening to this episode of Vision. If you’d like to learn more about Home Care Pulse, and how we partner with agencies like Right at Home, visit our website, homecarepulse.com. We provide more than blogs, eBooks, webinars, and podcasts, and we’d love to meet you and show you what more we can do for your agency. Head over to our website and take a look at our solutionspages and request a demo to see our platform in action. We’ll see you next time!